quite so keen as is usually imagined; and that they exercised, of choice, an expansive benevolence, at a period when Pro testants, similarly situated, were bloodthirsty and rapacious.

'Philosophy sanctions the belief, that power, held by any set of men without restraint or competition, is liable to abuse; and history teaches the humiliating fact, that power thus held has always been abused. To inquire who has been the greatest aggressor against the rights of human nature, when all who have been tempted have evinced a common propensity to trample upon the laws of justice and benevolence, would be an unprofitable procedure. The reformers punished heresy by death as well as the Catholics; and the murders perpetrated by intolerance, in the reign of Elizabeth, were not less atrocious than those which occurred under 'the bloody Mary.' We might even come nearer home, and point to colonies on our own continent, planted by men professing to have fled from religious persecution, who not only excluded from all civil and political rights those who were separated from them by only slight shades of religious belief, but persecuted many even to death, for heresy and witchcraft. Yet these things are not taken into the calculation; and Catholics are assumed, without examination, to be exclusively and especially prone to the sins of oppression and cruelty. "The French Catholics, at a very early period, commenced a system of missions for the conversion of the Indians, and were remarkably successful in gaining converts, and conciliating the confidence and affections of the tribes. While the Pequods and other northern tribes were becoming exterminated, or sold into slavery, the more fortunate savage of the Mississippi was listening to the pious counsels of the Catholic missionary. This is another fact, which deserves to be remembered, and which should be weighed in the examination of the testimony. It shows

"Advancing a little further in point of time, we find a number of colonies advancing rapidly towards prosperity, on our Atlantic seaboard. In point of civil government they were somewhat detached, each making its own municipal laws, and there being in each a predominance of the influence of one religious donomination. We might therefore expect to see the political bias of each sect carried out into practice; and it is curious to examine how far such was the fact. It is the more curious, because the writers and orators of one branch of this family of republics, are in the habit of attributing to their own fathers the principles of religious and political toleration, which became established throughout the whole, and are now the boast and pride of our nation. The impartial record of history affords on this subject a proof alike honorable to all, but which rebukes alike the sectional or sectarian vanity of each. New England was settled by English Puritans, New York by Dutch Protestants, Pennsylvania by Quakers, Maryland by Catholics, Virginia by the Episcopalian adherents of the Stuarts, and South Carolina by a mingled population of Roundheads and Cavaliers from England, and of French Huguenots-yet the same broad foundations of civil and political liberty were laid simultaneously in them all, and the same spirit of resistance animated each community, when the oppressions of the mother country became intolerable. Religious intolerance prevailed in carly times only in the eastern colonies; but the witchcraft superstition, though most strongly developed there, pervaded some other portions of the new settlements. We shall not amplify our remarks on this topic; it is enough to say, that if the love of monarchy was a component principle of the Catholic faith, it was not developed in our country when a fair opportunity was offered for its exercise; and that in the glorious struggle for liberty, for civil and religious emancipation-when our fathers arrayed themselves in defence of

the sacred principles involving the whole broad ground of contest between liberty and despotism, the Catholic and the Protestant stood side by side on the battlefield, and in the council, and pledged to their common country, with equal devotedness, their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor. Nor should it be forgotten, that in a conflict thus peculiarly marked, a Catholic king was our ally, when the most powerful of Protestant governments was our enemy."

We close, in the language of the great father of American liberty. In a reply to a patriotic address of the Catholics of the United States, the illustrious Washington thus gave utterance to his feelings : "Gentlemen:-While I now receive with much satisfaction your congratulations on my being called by an unanimous vote, to the first station in my country, I cannot but duly notice your politeness, in offering an apology for the unavoidable delay. As that delay has given you an opportunity of realizing, instead of anticipating, the benefits of the general government, you will do me the justice to believe, that your testimony of the increase of the public prosperity, enhances the pleasure, which I should otherwise have experienced from your affectionate address.

"I feel that my conduct, in war and in peace, has met with more general approbation that could have reasonably been expected; and I find myself disposed to consider that fortunate circumstance, in a great degree, resulting from the able support, and extraordinary candor, of my fellow-citizens of all denominations.

"The prospect of national prosperity now before us, is truly animating, and ought to excite the exertions of all good men, to establish and secure the happiness of their country, in the permanent duration of its freedom and independence. America, under the smiles of divine Providence, the protection of a good government, and the cultivation of manners, morals, and piety, cannot fail of attaining an uncommon degree of eminence in literature, commerce, agriculture, improvements at home, and respectability abroad.

"As mankind become more liberal, they will be more apt to allow, that all those who conduct themselves as worthy members of the community, are equally entitled to the protection of civil government. I hope ever to see America among the foremost nations in examples of justice and liberality. And I presume that your fellow-citizens will not forget the patriotic part which you took in the accomplishment of their revolution, and the establishment of their government, or the important assistance which they received from a nation in which the Roman Catholic faith is professed.

"I thank you, gentlemen, for your kind concern for me. While my life and my health shall continue, in whatever situation I may be, it shall be my constant endeavor to justify the favorable sentiments which you are pleased to express of my conduct. And may the members of your society in America, animated alone by the pure spirit of Christianity, and still conducting themselves as the faithful subjects of our government, enjoy every temporal and spiritual felicity."